Little Mrs. Muffet

I’ve been known to put my foot in my mouth from time to time (I’ll spare you the links), and I definitely did that today. Heather was so unsettled by what I said, in fact, that she threatened to burn down our house and move us all into a hotel room.

The trouble began yesterday afternoon when our pest control guy showed up to spray the perimeter of our home. We’d been having a bit of a problem with spiders outside, so we wanted to take care of it since we live with a little person and a little dog. Anyway, I chatted with the guy a bit before he got started, then let him do his thing. A half an hour later he was gone and I forgot all about it.

A few hours later, though, I was playing with Annie when Heather suddenly screamed as if she were doing an impression of Janet Leigh in “Psycho.” I ran into our office and found Heather – a known arachnophobe – wide eyed and pointing a shaky finger at a gigantic spider on the wall. Now I normally like to think I’m a big, tough man who has no problem killing spiders, but this time I didn’t feel so brave. The spider was HUGE!

Did someone say SPIDER?!?!”

“Can you kill it?” Heather asked. “Or do we need to get the vacuum?”

“I think it might be too big to fit in the vacuum.”

“WHAT?! REALLY?!”

“Joke. Just a joke.”

Heather frowned, unamused, and if I had any sense I would have taken that as a sign not to talk about the spider anymore. Unfortunately, I wasn’t that smart. I killed the spider, cleaned up the crime scene, and started out of the room. It was only when I was in the doorway, about to leave, that I decided to spin back and say one more thing.

“It’s funny. The pest control dude actually said that might happen.”

Heather glared at me, deadly serious. “Said what might happen?!”

“That we might see more spiders around for a couple days. They tend to want to get as far away from the spray as possible, you see, so the spiders –”

“MOVE INTO OUR HOME?!”

“Uh….” That was when it dawned on me I should have kept my mouth shut. “He didn’t say in our home, specifically, just… around.”

“‘AROUND?’ WHAT DOES ‘AROUND’ MEAN? ‘AROUND’ MY HEAD?”

There was no getting this genie back in the bottle.

“WE HAVE TO MOVE! YOU CANNOT TELL A PREGNANT WOMAN GIANT SPIDERS MIGHT BE MOVING INTO HER HOME!

And then:

“AAAAARRRRGGGHHHHH!! WHAT’S THAT ON THE TABLE? ANOTHER SPIDER?!”

“It’s a pencil, honey.”

“KILL IT!!! KILL IT NOW!!!!”

It took a good half an hour to talk Heather down after that. She seriously wanted to move, and it was only when I explained that burning down the house was impractical that she agreed to stay. Eventually, when she’d calmed down a bit, she said, “Why would you even tell me that?”

25 Comments

karen says:

We recently went to DisneyWorld with friends of ours and all of the kids. I couldn’t convince her to go in to the Tree of Life for the Bugs Life ride because giant *pretend* spiders descend from the ceiling for 30 seconds during the experience.

I often get a phone call if she walks to her car only to find a spider. Luckily I’m only 20 feet away, so I walk over and relocate it.

Unlike more fears… this is one that you can’t usually avoid. Poor Heather! I say you both start to train Annie to be fearless when it comes to them, that way Heather has two spider killers in the house.

Erin Christine says:

Michelle H says:

I have that fear too! When I was 7 months pregnant, I went to Babies R Us. It had an overhang at the entrance. It was dark when we came out and I happened to look up and see that TONS of spiders made there home on that overhang. You HAVE to walk under it to go in the store. I went in, got an employee, brought him out, and told him all those HAD to go because one was going to fall on a pregnant lady and send her into pre-term labor and they would get sued. He looked at me like I was crazy. Which I was and still am when it involves spiders!

Always spray inside before spraying outside or they will come in. I learned that the hard way too!

Amy C. says:

Okay, now that made me laugh out loud for real. So true! Women aren’t the only ones scared of spiders. I have seen many a man quake, jump, scream (and hide behind me!), upon discovering a spider. So I could easily see a guy either peeing his pants or dropping dead of a heart attack.
You know, a lot of people think that spiders are our buddies. They eat bugs and all that and hide out in corners. Yeah right. They are vengeful and angry. One time when I was using the potty I happened to look down while I was wiping and YES there was a spider THERE. One of those horrible ones with the long legs. Don’t ask me how it got there. Anyway, as it died its miserable death swirling down the toilet drain I swear I could hear it laughing.

Mommy says:

Omg gross. I would never get over seeing a spider there. And yes, they are vengeful bastards. I hate them all. I had to vacuum one so big the other day that I was sure he would climb out of the vacuum and eat my face off. So I had to leave the vacuum outside and then it rained. Whoops. Hubby is still mad since it was the dyson. Time to buy a spider vacuum I guess. They make those, right?

Amy C. says:

Seriously laughing right now. Your comment was SO funny! Isn’t that just like a husband to get mad at something like that? I think that is perfectly reasonable! Actually I probably would have set the Dyson on fire.

Jess says:

Omg me too. With snakes. Told my coworkers if there is a snake by the entrance at work I’d call off if someone didn’t move it. My dad knew if he saw a snake in the yard not to tell me or I wouldn’t leave the house. Any time they saw one they never told me because I would never leave the house.

I was at a party last year and my friend brought her snake (no lie) to the party. Everyone laughed because I jumped across the table to get away.

My roommate and I have a deal. No snakes near me or anywhere near the apartment and I’ll kill the spiders. Unless it’s a really big spider then we’re both doomed.

We live in upstate NY and in the country to boot. Given that it’s winter here, all the creepy crawlies are looking for a warm place to hang out. Earlier this week we had an electrician here to install some outlets in our garage- work that required that he get behind our electric panel. When he removed the panel, he found a dead snake that had crawled in our wall and electrocuted itself.

I still have not told my husband as I seriously don’t think he’d sleep in our house any more if he knew there was once a snake in the wall.

Jess says:

Lindsey says:

Sooo funny!! Luckily I am only afraid of roaches. My poor daughter’s boyfriend is so embarrasses if we see a roach and scream for him to kill it. He doesn’t want to admit he hates them as much as the screaming women!! When my kids were little, if they came screaming from another room that they saw a roach, my first question was always, “Is it alive?” and because of that, my son who was really young at the time must have thought “alive” was the name of the thing all the women were screaming about – so when he was old enough to talk and he saw a bug – he would point at it and scream “Lie, Lie!!” Maybe you just had to be there!! Anyway, my favorite Ed Bassmaster video, just for you, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9auRjDHV3E

Glenda says:

slightly peeved says:

Mike,
My husband used to say that type of thing as well and then think
oops! bad idea, she’s upset. When my son was a teenager, he would warn his father of the danger zone by saying: “Dad, do you have a death wish? If not, stop talking now!”

So I sympathize with Heather and her reaction, but you are such a great husband and dad, you can only be forgiven.

Ew, I hate spiders. Unfortunately, my husband thinks it’s ridiculous to be afraid of spiders, so although he is willing to come kill them when I scream for help, he has an attitude about it. Once I walked into the bathroom, and as I closed the door, I spotted a huge spider behind it. I shrieked and ran for my husband, who had fallen asleep on the couch. He stumbled, half-awake to the bathroom. I heard a “thunk” and he came out. I walked back in and THERE WAS ANOTHER GIANT SPIDER just chilling on my towel. I screamed again, totally unnerved. He came back in, really grumpy this time, and killed it. The next morning, I was talking about how freaky it was to have two of them in the bathroom, and he admitted that the first time he went in he couldn’t find it, so he thumped his shoe on the ground and LIED TO ME.

I’m still not sure why I didn’t leave him over that.

By the way, I live in Washington, home of the Giant House Spider. Go ahead, Google it. I dare you.

Mommy says:

This is why I ALWAYS make my husband show me the evidence. Once he smacked a giant one and it fell behind the bed. He claimed it was dead and it wasn’t . . . and it came after me. I swear that thing knew I’d put a hit out on it.

Lisa says:

yeah just great our pest guy NEVER said the bugs would come in more, he sprays every 2 months (we live in FL)
we had a HUGE spider as big as a cats head I swear!!! came out from behind the TV (mounted on the wall) and moseyed out for a stroll. Me screaming blood murder, screaming at my husband who is even more afraid then I am. I told him kill it or I’m divorcing you!!!
Thank you Jesus for spider spray that shoots up to 10ft. I think we drowned it in death in a can. poor Sailor(3) was buried under my blankets on my bed crying spider, didnt help for the rest of the night anything that remotely looked like a spider sent her screaming, even the mention of S-P-I D you get the picture….

TamaraL says:

Ohhh Mike! THINK before you speak!! I actually did the same thing with my teenaged daughter, who is terrified of bugs. I wanted to slap myself when I told her that the bugs might be worse for a few days. I told her, they were worse, and we all lived.

Auntie_M says:

OMG!! You kill me!!! Serious case of foot in mouth disease!! LOL
And between the pictures your words painted in my mind and the images from the Raising Hope spider episodes…dyin’ here! Now imagining Heather & Annie sleeping with nylons on their heads to keep the spiders out of their hair/ears. Seriously LMAO!!!